Redo Backup & Recovery is an Ubuntu-based live CD featuring backup, restore, and disaster recovery software. It centres around an easy-to-use graphical program for running bare-metal backup and recovery on hard disk partitions, as well as on external hard drives and network shares. The CD also includes several popular data recovery programs and a web browser.

Screenlets are small owner-drawn applications (written in Python) that can be described as "the virtual representation of things lying/standing around on your desk". Sticknotes, clocks, rulers, ... the possibilities are endless.

The goal of the Screenlets base-classes is to simplify the creation of fully themeable mini-apps that each solve basic desktop-work-related needs and generally improve the usability and eye-candy of the modern composited Linux-desktop.

The default menu application in Ubuntu is functional, but it is also down to earth basic. GnoMenu tries to replicate the looks and functionality of KDE's Menu application. And I have to say, it almost does. GnoMenu comes with a number of themes and a easy to use configuration menu. Looks like it deserves a try isn't it? Let's give it a shot.

GnoMenu looks pretty. Period.
A nice looking configuration menu with a lot of options which is intuitive as well.

GnoMenu's XML theme engine supports a wide variety of themes, even those with transparency effects. Latest GnoMenu 2.8 brings in a lot of improvements especially with regard to speed and usability. After using GnoMenu for a day, it felt really solid and fun to use. Definitely worth a try, I would say.

How to Install GnoMenu in Ubuntu Lucid, Karmic using GnoMenu PPA?

GnoMenu PPA will give you the latest updates and changes. Lets see how to install GnoMenu in Ubuntu from PPA.

Q: Why do you want to make Linux into a Microsoft Windows 7 clone?
A: I don't. The goal of DockbarX isn't to be a clone of the Windows 7 task bar. Windows 7 task bar has a good principle, though. When it comes to your most used programs it's more productive to do all window handling - launching, selecting, closing, etc. from the same few pixels. If I need a Firefox window I move my mouse cursor to the same spot on the screen regardless of which Firefox window I want and or if I even have opened a Firefox window yet. This behavior is good and it would be stupid not to implement it just because "Windows had it first". Don't reduce your productivity out of stubbornness. When it comes to looks, it's up to you to choose a theme that looks like windows 7 or a theme that doesn't look that way.

eCryptfs (the Enterprise Cryptographic Filesystem) is a POSIX-compliant encrypted filesystem that has been part of the mainline Linux Kernel since version 2.6.19. The eCryptfs package has been included in Ubuntu since version 9.04. It is a form of disk encryption software similar to Microsoft's Encrypting File System and Apple's FileVault.[citation needed]

Chances are if you’ve tried out a custom panel background before you’ve encountered the annoyingly artefact-y look that of the panel atop this screenshot: -

There’s a quick hack to fix it, giving you the beauty of the panel.

We’ll need to get our hands a little bit dirty for this but providing you’re careful it’s of no great effort.

This guide will assume you’re using Ambiance as your GTK theme. If you’re using a different theme substitute the path in the commands below for the correct one of your theme.

You can fix this by commenting out or removing the include

“apps/gnome-panel.rc”

* gksu gedit /usr/share/themes/Ambiance/gtk-2.0/gtkrc
* Gedit will open
* Press ALT+F to open the ‘find’ bar
* Enter “apps/gnome-panel.rc” (sans quote marks)
* Enter a hash (#) at the beginning of the line to ‘comment it out’.
* Hit Save.

Note that in order for the panel background to adhere to the ‘system theme’ you will need to remove the ‘#’ from the beginning of the same line in the same file.

WinFF is a GUI for the command line video converter, FFMPEG. It will convert most any video file that FFmpeg will convert. WinFF does multiple files in multiple formats at one time. You can for example convert mpeg's, flv's, and mov's, all into avi's all at once.

"The Lightweight Portable Security distribution was created by the Software Protection Initiative under the direction of the Air Force Research Laboratory and the U.S. Department Of Defense. The idea behind it is that government workers can use a CD-ROM or USB stick to boot into a tamper proof, pristine desktop when using insecure computers such as those available in hotels or a worker's own home. The environment that it offers should be largely resistant to Internet-borne security threats such as viruses and spyware, particularly when launched from read-only media such as a CDROM. The LPS system does not mount the hard drive of the host machine, so leaves no trace of the user's activities behind."

After playing with Lightweight Portable Security for a few days, I have to say I'm a bit disappointed. The one thing the distro has going for it is hardware support (it handled both my test machines well), but beyond that the experience was a series of let-downs. The distro isn't, by Linux standards, particularly lightweight (the ISO is 144 MB and LPS uses over 300 MB of RAM when sitting idle at the desktop); distributions such as SliTaz and Puppy offer more features with a smaller footprint. The system doesn't feel particularly secure either, with the user always running as root, passwords stored in the open, Flash enabled by default and Firefox Sync installed. The encryption wizard is easy to use, but seems limited in the types of encryption it can handle. And, perhaps it is overly picky of me, but if the Department of Defense wanted to rip off a Windows theme to make their software seem familiar to their employees, why did they pick a look from fifteen years ago?

I think the makers of LPS would have been further ahead if they had based their distribution off an existing Linux distro. There are plenty of small and secure Linux live CDs available and, for that matter, several full-featured ones, depending on what the Department wanted. They could have had more features or more security with an off-the-shelf distro. As it stands, LPS probably accomplishes the task it was created for, but it does not do so elegantly.

Since the day I switched my primary OS to Linux, specifically Linux Mint, I was in search for a good audio and video converter. I know, there are powerful command line converters like ffmpeg and mencoder. But it is just easier to have a GUI, it is difficult remember all those commands. Isn't it? So finally, I found one, free and open source, and it doesn't make me disappointed.

So, the converter is, Mobile Media Converter. It uses mencoder for conversion, but can also use ffmpeg. It is just a GUI to the most powerful converters, but simpler. Simpler doesn't mean you lose control over the options the command line tools offer, MMC still gives you full control over all the parameters.

It doesn't just convert videos, but has friendly interfaces for trimming and cropping videos too. Also, embedded subtitles can be encoded onto the video for watching movies or shows with subtitles on devices that does not supports them.

You can crop a video easily to remove those ugly black borders, without having to figure out the command line parameters.

By default, MMC comes with many commonly used presets for different formats, more available online, from the application's interface itself. Not to mention, if you are not satisfied, you can customize any preset to create your own.

An integrated YoutTube downloader is also there to let you directly download and convert Youtube videos. It also allows to choose the quality of the video.

The best part is, it is completely free and open source, available for Linux, Windows and Mac OS X. Precompiled packages are available for Ubuntu, Windows and Mac OS X. For other Linux distros, you can compile from the source which is available at launchpad. It has no new releases for a long time, but it just works.

1: Performance
Once KDE left the tried-and-true 3.5 branch and began itself anew, the performance was horrible. On lesser machines, KDE 4.0 would drag to a crawl. That is not the case with 4.5. The KDE development team has made huge strides in not only matching but surpassing the GNOME desktop in terms of performance. KDE 4.5 is fast… as fast as any other desktop that matches it feature for feature. The only way to go a faster route is to adopt a lighter, performance-centric window manager like Fluxbox or an even lighter weight desktop like Xfce4.

2: Stability
KDE 4.5 has finally reached the point in its release where it feels, from top to bottom, as stable as any other desktop. No more will you get the feeling your desktop is going to blow at any minute. Just in the move from 4.4 to 4.5, there were 16,022 bugs fixed. That’s a LOT of bugs. And it shows. That giant effort on the part of the developers paid off in full. The difference between KDE 4.4 and 4.5 is astounding in terms of stability.

3: Activities
This is one of those features that many people simply won’t use. But for those who do use it, Activities is a whole new way to approach the desktop that takes organization to another level. Now you can associate desktops with activities and have multiple activities on a single workspace. You can associate applications or files with Activities so that you have specific files or instances of applications on a specific activity. This makes the Linux desktop a muli-level, mult-dimensional desktop that no other desktop can even come close to replicating.

4: Desktop effects
Gone is the need to rely on Compiz as a compositor for the desktop. KDE now has an effective, built-in compositor that can almost match Compiz. With 4.5, this feature is incredibly stable and isn’t nearly the performance hog it was. If you like your eye candy but are not a fan of rolling Compiz into KDE, then KDE 4.5 is exactly what you need.

5: Window tiling
Much to the chagrin of Windows 7 users, Microsoft didn’t invent tiling windows. Neither did Linux, for that matter. But both operating systems have this feature. KDE 4.5 brings an effective, highly configurable window tiling feature that allows you to tile in different manners as well as configure specific windows as floating windows. This is yet another feature that users are going to either love or hate, but those who love it will appreciate how easy tiling makes it to organize the desktop, as well as how configurable KDE’s tiling window feature is.

6: Notification area
Of all the operating systems I have used, I have to say the new KDE 4.5 notification area is one of the cleanest and easiest to use. The KDE development team has done a great job tightly integrating the notification area into the KDE panel. Of course, a mention of the notification area must also include a mention of the notification system. KDE has revised the way warnings and notifications are presented to the user. No more single message bubble or popup. Now the notifications come in the form of a clean progress indicator that allows the user to delete any or all of the notifications. This system is unobtrusive and efficient. And not only are event notifications displayed in this manner, Plasma Widgets notifications are too.

7: Netbook interface
The new release of KDE for Netbooks offers a ton of improvements, most of which users won’t directly see as much as they will notice in the form of serious performance enhancements. The KDE Netbook interface is fast and sleek and now includes better support for touchscreen interfaces.

8: Plasmoids
The Plasmoids have finally reached a level of usability where one can actually see why KDE has continued to include them in the product. This is especially so with the social networking tools and the monitoring tool. There are Plasmoids to monitor (and display) Web pages so you can keep up to date on your favorite pages (or just know when a change is made to the page) and plenty of other tools. But the big difference in 4.5 is that the Plasmoids are far more stable and functional than ever before.

9: Applications
Across the board, the KDE applications have received plenty of attention. The only exception is KOffice, which has received plenty of work, but the new release was not ready for 4.5. (It will drop with the next release.) Included with the updates to the applications is the WebKIT, which allows users to have a Konqueror browser with a WebKIT rendering engine. The speed increase is quite noticeable (especially when dealing with JavaScript). But all around, the improvements to the KDE applications help make KDE 4.5 a far superior experience to any 4.x release, as well as on par (and superior in many ways) to GNOME.

10: Overall look
When you boot into the KDE 4.5 desktop, you will instantly see a highly polished, professional-looking desktop. KDE 4.5 is modern without lacking a professional look and feel suitable for business. The KDE desktop look and feel should appeal to a wide range of users from home to business and everything in between.

Give it a try…
Are you intrigued? Don’t you want to go out and have at KDE 4.5 now? To be honest, I was a big skeptic at first. But the improvements made to KDE in 4.5 have me sold on this desktop. The activities alone help me to be far more organized — and that’s worth the price of admission.

1: KMail
KMail is important for any user migrating from Mac who was/is fond of Apple Mail. It has a similar look and feel to Apple Mail and offers a nice feature list that will make you right at home with your email client. The biggest downfall of KMail is that to connect to an Exchange server, that server must have IMAP enabled. KMail is also a part of the Kontact groupware suite. Kontact can certainly stand toe to toe with other groupware suites –with the exception of Exchange integration. But Kontact can connect with other groupware servers, such as Kolab, OpenXchange, and GroupWise.

2: KRDC
KRDC is a powerful remote desktop client that allows the user to connect to both RDP and VNC servers. KRDC was completely overhauled in the Google Summer of Code 2007 to be included in the KDE 4.0 release. It s features include a tabbed interface, full screen mode, Windows port, KDE Wallet support, and a new configuration wizard. Connecting to a server is so simple, any level of user should be able to handle it.

3: Kexi
Kexi enables Linux users to use and reuse databases created by Microsoft Access. It can also read MySQL and PostgreSQL databases. Kexi has a user-friendly GUI that offers numerous features, such as a full GUI for the creation of databases, tables, and data and running query and parametric query support. Kexi allows the user to create tables, queries, forms, reports, and scripts all from a powerful graphical interface.

4: KPlato
KPlato is another piece of the KOffice groupware suite that really shines. This project management tool allows the user to manage moderately large projects that include multiple resources. KPlato lets the creator of a project use different types of task dependencies and time constraints, do estimates, and schedule tasks according to network and resource availability. This outstanding project management tool also features Work and Vacation, Cost Breakdown Structure, Dependencies (both graph and list), Project/Task Perfomance Charts, Work Packaging View, Gantt charts, Resource assignments, and much more. With KPlato, a project can be rescheduled and will retain all of its original scheduling. KPlato should make any project manager happy.

5: Kate
Kate is one of the more powerful GUI-based text editors you will find. Kate is actually two parts: KatePart (the underlying framework used in a number of KDE applications that require a text editor) and Kate (the MDI text editor application). With Kate, you have a window splitable, tabbed interface that allows you to keep multiple documents open at once. Additional features include spell checking, CR/CRLF/LF newline support, encoding support, encoding conversion, syntax highlighting, regular expression-based find and replace, and block selection mode. Kate will be much more at home in newer Linux users’ hands (those who do not want to try the likes of vi, emacs, or nano).

6: Klipper
Klipper is one of the most powerful clipboards available to any operating system. It not only allows you instant access to a history of copied text, but it also allows you to create Actions that can be applied to specifically formatted copied text (such as automatically opening a Web browser for copied text that begins with “http://”.

7: Konqueror with Webkit
If you like the GUI of Konqueror but are not terribly happy with having KHTML as the rendering engine, you will be happy to know that you can have Konqueror with the Webkit engine instead. Although the average user might not appreciate this combination, the power user will certainly like the increased speed the Webkit rendering engine adds. The speed increase is especially noticeable when dealing with heavy JavaScript pages.

8: KBackup
KBackup is one of the easiest-to-use backup utilities for the desktop you will find. It has a great user interface that allows a user of nearly any experience level to create both local and remote backups. KBackup can do full and incremental backups and does so very quickly. KBackup saves in the .tar file format. Its only downfall is that you need to make sure you have a recent version (as of this writing, 1.2.11) to get scheduled backups.

9: KMyMoney
KMyMoney is a fine example of how Linux developers can create an application that handles a significant task (accounting) and make it simple without losing power and features. KMyMoney has three primary goals: simplicity, accuracy, and familiar features and it succeeds with each one. Whereas GNUCash focuses primarily on higher-level accounting (but can be used for home or business finances as well), KMyMoney focuses on serving as a personal finance manager with the added bonus of using a double-entry accounting style. KMyMoney also has an optional plug-in that enables online banking.

10: KSystemLog
KSystemLog is for all you Linux admins out there who don’t want to take the time to use a text-based editor or the less command to view your system log files. With this handy log view tool, you can have all of your system logs at your fingertips in one simple GUI front end. With no more than a double-click, you can open a system log entry and know exactly what’s going on with that particular system. With the click of a button, you can switch to viewing system logs, kernel logs, authentication logs, daemon logs, and X.org logs. When you click on a category, all its entries are populated in the main window. You can then double-click on an individual entry to view the details. This tool is a must-have for any admin looking for a solid GUI to take the place of text-based log viewing.

Yum (or apt-get): I love the simplicity and reliability of these installation tools.

Of course this only scratches the surface. I could mention OpenOffice because I write so much. But if I didn't have OpenOffice I could use AbiWord or Word Perfect. I could mention FireFox but FireFox runs on damn-near everything. There are also some honorable mentions that go to:

HOWTO setup a static mountpoint for an optical drive in Ubuntu/Mint/Debian

Verify the device name for your optical drive(s) in a terminal window:

lshw -C disk

(you might need to add sudo before the command, but try without first)

Drive info is reported- check the device assignment for your optical drive. It may be

/dev/sr0
/dev/sr1
etc

These are equivalent to the drive letter assignments in Windows.

For an optical drive (CDROM, DVD-ROM, BluRay, etc) assigned to

Quote:

/dev/sr0

create a mountpoint directory called "cdrom0" (or any other name you want) under /media/. Use root privileges (sudo):

sudo mkdir /media/cdrom0

Next, open the file /etc/fstab also as root (admin rights) with a text editor:

Quote:

sudo gedit /etc/fstab

(you can replace gedit with any text editor you want- mouspad, vim, etc)

Copy/paste the following line to the end of the fstab file:

Quote:

/dev/sr0 /media/cdrom0 udf,iso9660 user,noauto,exec 0 0

replace /dev/sr0 with whatever device reported from the lshw command above (/dev/sr1, /dev/sr2, etc) and /cdrom0 with the mountpoint directory you created (I call mine optical0 or the make/model of the physical optical drive, like PLEXTOR716)

Save the fstab file, exit text editor

Reboot (or log out/back in)

This is useful for many reasons:

- controlling execution of files from optical discs inserted in the drive
- having the same mountpoint for all optical discs inserted in the same physical drive vs. every disc being assigned a different mountpoint based on its disclabel
- fixing auto detect issues in apps, particularly Wine apps like DVDFab
- perhaps other issues.

Using this method, optical drives are treated similar to the way Windows handles them- Windows' drive letter act like a static mountpoint for all optical discs inserted into the same physical optical drive. You could even name the mountpoint /media/D or whatever "drive letter" you want.

#1: Codendi
Codendi is an open-source collaborative development platform offered by Xerox. From only one interface, it gathers, all the needed tools for software development teams: management and versioning of code, bugs, requirements, documents, reporting, tests etc. It is mainly used for managing software project processes.

Download Codendi
#2: Redmine
Redmine is a flexible project management web application. Written using Ruby on Rails framework, it is cross-platform and cross-database. It includes calendar and gantt charts to aid visual representation of projects and their deadlines.

Download redmine
#3: ProjectPier
ProjectPier is a Free, Open-Source, self-hosted PHP application for managing tasks, projects and teams through an intuitive web interface. ProjectPier will help your organization communicate, collaborate and get things done Its function is similar to commercial groupware/project management products, but allows the freedom and scalability of self-hosting.

Download ProjectPier
#4: Trac
Trac is an open source, web-based project management and bug-tracking tool. Trac allows hyperlinking information between a computer bug database, revision control and wiki content. It also serves as a web interface to a version control system like Subversion, Git, Mercurial, Bazaar and Darcs.

Download Trac
#5: Project HQ
Project HQ is a collaborative open source project management tool, similar to Basecamp and activeCollab. Project HQ is built on open source technologies like Python, Pylons and SQLAlchemy and is fully database independent. Project HQ uses a structured workflow to assist you in managing your projects.

Download Project HQ
#6: Collabtive
Collabtive is a web-based project management software that is being published as Open Source software. The project was started in November 2007. It strives to provide an Open Source alternative to proprietary tools like Basecamp or ActiveCollab.

Download Collabtive
#7: eGroupWare
eGroupWare is a free open source groupware software intended for businesses from small to enterprises. Its primary functions allow users to manage contacts, appointments, projects and to-do lists.

It is used either via its native web-interface, making access platform-independent, or by using different supported groupware clients, such as Kontact, Novell Evolution, or Microsoft Outlook. It can also be used by mobile phone or PDA via SyncML.

Download eGroupWare
#8: KForge
KForge is an open-source (GPL) system for managing software and knowledge projects. It re-uses existing best-of-breed tools such as a versioned storage (subversion), a tracker (trac), and wiki (trac or moinmoin), integrating them with the system’s own facilities (projects, users, permissions etc). KForge also provides a complete web interface for project administration as well a fully-developed plugin system so that new services and features can be easily added.

Download KForge
#9: OpenGoo
It is a complete online solution focused on improving productivity, collaboration, communication and management of your teams. OpenGoo main features include document management, contact management, e-mail, project management, and time management. Text documents and presentations can be created and edited online. Files can be uploaded, organized and shared, independent of file formats.

Download OpenGoo
#10: ClockingIT
ClockingIT is a free Project Management solution, which helps your team stay focused and on top of things.